Here we give a long list of data
sets on "Global Income and Wealth Distribution"
1- Microdata Based
PovcalNet
Type of Data:
PovcalNet is an online tool hosted by the World Bank which calculates various
poverty and income inequality measures underlying WB’s WDI (World Development Indicators). Its aim is
to cover as many countries and years as possible starting from 1980. It also provides
grouped data in the form of population and income shares but the underlying household surveys are not accessible.
Access: The data can be accessed from here
LIS (Luxembourg Income and Wealth Study Database)
Type of Data:
LIS is the largest available income database of harmonised microdata collected
from about 50 countries in Europe, North America, Latin America, Africa, Asia,
and Australasia spanning five decades. The LIS datasets contain variables on market income,
public transfers and taxes, household- and person-level characteristics, labour
market outcomes, and, in some datasets, expenditures. It is also the only
source providing microdata on wealth.
Access:
Access to the LIS (and LWS) microdata
bases is achieved through a remote-execution system called LISSY. LISSY
allows researchers to access data while respecting privacy restrictions
required by the countries providing the data. It permits
researchers to submit programs written in SAS, SPSS or Stata, which are quickly
processed from remote locations. Aggregated results are reported back to users
within a few minutes. One must register to obtain access to LISSY. For
students (anywhere) and non-student researchers in certain countries, access to
the micro data is free. here
OECD IDD (OECD Income Distribution Data Base)
Type of Data: IDD reports information on the country members
of the OECD, and the Russian Federation. IDD contains information on 70
indicators on the country members of the OECD (plus the Russian Federation)
classified in four categories: income levels, inequality, poverty, and
population. Each measure is presented for three different population groups:
(i) the entire population, (ii) the population of working age (18 to 65) adults,
and (iii) those of retirement age (66 and over). The database reports eight inequality
measures: the Gini coefficient for the distribution of equivalized household
disposable income (post taxes and transfers), the standard error of that Gini
coefficient, the Gini coefficient before taxes and transfers, the P90/P10,
P90/P50 and P50/P10 income decile ratios, the S80/S20 income quintile share
ratio, and the S90/S10 income decile share ratio.
Access: The information can
be accessed from here.
CEPALSTAT
Type of Data: CEPALSTAT is the
statistical database of the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin
America and the Caribbean. CEPALSTAT includes a wide range of data and a
variety of economic, sociodemographic, and environmental measures for the
region, including inequality and poverty estimates.
Access: The data file can be
downloaded from here.
SEDLAC
Type of Data: SEDLAC provides
statistics on poverty and inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean. It is
compiled by a partnership between the Center for Distributional, Labor, and
Social Studies at the Universidad Nacional of La Plata (CEDLAS- UNLP) and the
World Bank’s Poverty Global Practice.
Access: The data file can be
downloaded from here.
WID (World Wealth and Income Data Base)
Type of Data: WTID (World Top Income Data Base) provides top income shares of more
than 40 countries often derived from tax records. WID also provides time
series of wealth-income ratios, as well as of wealth aggregates. WID aims to cover the whole income and wealth distributions
(not only the top) to produce Distributional National Accounts (DINA)
annual estimates of the distribution of income and wealth.
Access: The data can be accessed from here.
2- Secondary
Data Source
WIID (World Income Inequality Database)
Type of Data: Hosted by UNU-WIDER, WIID provides income inequality indices (the Gini index and
quintile shares) for as many countries and years as possible from various
sources. Its coverage is more than PovcalNet but it is less harmonized.
Access: The data file can be
downloaded from here.
ATG (All
The Ginis)
Type of Data: This database provides Gini coefficients retrieved from nine sources in order to
create a single “standardized” Gini variable. The nine sources are: LIS, SEDLAC,
SILC, ECA, WYD, POVCAL, WIID, CEPAL, INDIE. ATG covers the years 1950 to
2012, with 164 countries included and over 3,000 separate Ginis.
Access: The data file can be accessed from here.
SWIID (Standardized World Income Inequality Database)
Type of Data: SWIID aims
to provide income inequality data that seek to maximize comparability while
providing the broadest possible coverage of countries and years. It incorporates
various types of Gini indices for as many countries and as many years as possible
along with estimates of uncertainty around them by using various data sources.
It also computes missing Gini’s using multiple imputation technique.
Access: The data can be obtained from here.
Chartbook of Economic Inequality (Atkinson &
Morelli)
Type of Data:
Provides 25 charts representing income inequality, top income shares, poverty
measures, dispersion of earning and top wealth shares for 25 countries covering
more than one hundred years. The countries are: Argentina, Brazil, Australia,
Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan,
Malaysia, Mauritius, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Singapore, South
Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK and the US.
Access: The figures can be
download from here
3- Others
There are still other data sets (some listed below). Further
information will be provided in the future.
EU-SILC (European Community Household Panel Study) link
GCIP (Global Consumption and Income
Project) link
CEQ (Commitment to Equity Database) link
UTIP (University of Texas Inequality Project) link
Gini Project link
(HHB) Historical Household Budgets link